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+SIEGEL – LEFT BRAIN – REASON

ENDNOTES left brain

10-15-6

“When information is presented to only the left hemisphere, verbal output reflects an effort to create a story or make sense of what it sees or hears…called this the “interpreter” function of the left hemisphere. For the isolated left hemisphere, these words are confabulations – made-up stories that fit with the data, but are unrelated to the gist or context of the situation….the left hemisphere appears to lack the contextual representations of the right hemisphere, but nevertheless creates a story to explain the limited information at its disposal. The left hemisphere uses syllogistic reasoning, stating major and minor premises and deducing logical conclusions from a limited set of data in an attempt to clarify cause-effect relationships…..contextual elements do not appear to be perceived by the left hemisphere, or at least they are ignored when it comes to explaining what the scene is about. The left hemisphere’s interpreter function seems to be driven primarily by a need to reason about cause-effect relationships, rather than to establish some coordinated or coherent view of “truth.” In this manner, some authors have suggested that the left hemisphere may be primarily responsible for the creation of distorted and “false” memories of past experiences. (siegel/tdm/326)”

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“The left hemisphere tries to create explanations for the information it receives, but it lacks the ability to process the context of this information, and so its conclusions are based on selected details without relational meaning. The left hemisphere’s interpreter deduces an explanation that is superficially logical but is often without contextual substance if this hemisphere is acting in isolation from information from the right hemisphere. (siegel/tdm/327)”